Page:Curiosities of Olden Times.djvu/160

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Curiosities of Olden Times

regarded and administered. Dr. Cohausen would, as soon as look at you, write a prescription containing, among other items, so many respirations of the breath of little girls to be taken in scented smoke.

lb. oz. drm.
R. Gum Olibani 1 8
Gum Styrac 2
Gum Myrri 2
Gum Benz. 4
Corb. casc. pulv. 4
Anhel. puellarum. quant. suff.

When the question does arise, how the damsels will like this treatment, the doctor brushes it aside with imperturbable coolness. It will be a great honour to them, to be thus rendered conducive to the prolongation of male life. Indeed, it will cause them not to be held as cheap as they are now. At present they are good-for-noughts; but employed to infuse the breath of life into men's lungs, they will be respected and valued.

And now, with a flourish of horns, he introduces the "Wondrous discovery of philosophical chymistry," of which he boasted on his title-page. "Now then, O ye cooks of Gebri, or, that I may give you your better title, ye sons of Hermes, who has taught you to extract the marvellous stone of the philosophers from the fire, that thereby ye may be skilled to sustain a protracted life! Now will I disclose to you a new philosophy! The once famous hermetic philosopher in France, Johann Petsus Faber of Montpelier,

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